Hot Family Selection

Our homestay families are carefully selected for their hospitality, friendliness and warmth. They all offer clean lodging in safe neighborhoods.

The School's homestay coordinators visit each family and get to know them personally. We also ask students to evaluate their homestay experience before they leave so we can ensure that families are constantly providing students with a good service.

There are many different types of families (with or without children, married couples, single parents, young or older, etc.) We assign the homestay families according to the preferences the students select in their registration form.

Just let us know what type of family you would like and any preferences you may have (pets, diet, smoking, etc.) and we will make every effort to place you with the best family for you.

The most important quality we consider when choosing a host family is that they are genuinely interested and excited about hosting a foreign student. Even though the families receive a fee for their service, it is important that the family is not doing it just for the money but for the experience of sharing their home and culture.

We look for opened-minded, friendly and outgoing families. Talkative, warm and protective "mothers", friendly but respectful "fathers" and friendly, well behaved children.

It is also important that the whole family be willing and open to having a student in their home so that the student feels totally welcome and at home.

First we have the families fill out an application form with all their information: names, ages, pets, other family members who live in the home, schedules, who spends more time at home, etc. We choose the families that seem the most suitable, considering the family composition, neighborhood, and access to public transportation. Then we visit each one personally. We spend some time with the family, try to meet each member, talk about their interests, their family activities and their concerns about hosting a foreign student, and explain about cultural differences and special situations that have occurred in the past.

We also try to have as much information available as possible about the student (age, interests, diet, personality, expectations about living with a family, etc.) so we can tell the family in advance and prepare them as much as possible for the student's arrival.

When the family is really looking forward to hosting a student, and the student is also friendly and considerate, things always work out and cultural differences are not a problem.